[cap-talk] Connection between UAC and Multics proposal

[Norman Hardy]

I wrote to Fred Spiessens and included the following paragraph. Just  
now it occurs to me that the new Windows UAC makes the error that  
Multics avoided (as described below). The typical user does not have  
the information necessary to make a decision. Even the very savvy  
user generally has no way to know.


As far as I know you have broken new ground.
At one point in early Multics design there was a proposal to protect  
a file by installing a program that would run at open time in order  
to decide whether to allow access. Before they implemented this it  
was realized that the program would not have the necessary  
information to decide.
They did not implement it. They understood the problem that you  
elucidate, but informally.